American-owned ASDA Group offers UK shoppers everything from frankfurters to diamond rings. Owned by retail giant Wal-Mart Stores, ASDA is the UK's second-largest food seller (behind Tesco).
It operates about 639 stores (including about 25 ASDA Living stores) that primarily sell groceries and apparel. The stores also sell CDs, books, videos, and housewares. It offers American, Chinese, and Mexican take-away meals.
Since being bought by Wal-Mart in 1999, ASDA has set off a price war in the UK by initiating Wal-Mart's aggressive "price-rollback" program and converting stores to Wal-Mart's supercenter format under the ASDA-Wal-Mart banner.
Asda was the second-largest supermarket chain in Britain between 2003 and 2014 by market share, at which point it fell into third place. Since April 2019 it has regained its second-place position, behind Tesco and ahead of Sainsbury's.